Arcadia, IN

Arcadia is a Hamilton County town laid out in the 1840s as the railroad was coming through. John and Harriet Shaffer's land and the adjoining Waltz property became the center of the town, and the railroad connected the new settlement with Indianapolis and Peru. Farming drove the early economy, but the town also collected a cigar factory, cabinet shop, flour and sawmill, planing mill, and the businesses that filled its downtown. Hamilton Heights schools serve the municipality today. Arcadia is a small Indiana town whose streets still hold the sequence clearly: land, rail line, farm trade, downtown, school.